


Place de la Comédie

by LittleLinor



Category: Cardfight!! Vanguard
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:48:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26800915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleLinor/pseuds/LittleLinor
Summary: Chrono is on holiday. Ibuki is absolutely, definitely not being a lost puppy about it.
Relationships: Ibuki Kouji/Shindou Chrono
Comments: 10
Kudos: 9





	Place de la Comédie

**Author's Note:**

> This is just mindless fluff, enjoy

Kouji Ibuki liked to think he wasn’t a very clingy person.  
The important nuance, he thought, lay in whether one actually did the clinging. He was aware that he felt attachments strongly, had become aware over time that the passionate feelings that he so related to in stories were narrative enhancements to most, and that having had the good sense not to show how much he craved the attention of people he cared about was probably the only reason his bullying hadn’t spiralled even further out of control as a child, but when it came to his actions, he had always been careful to maintain a careful distance, to not let himself rely on others, to not be Too Much.  
But now, having actually entered a relationship and gotten a taste of living with someone who gave him all the attention he wanted without him even needing to ask for it, he found that no matter how little clinging he actually did, the sheer force of the _yearning_ he was experiencing probably made the nuance irrelevant.  
He did not _resent_ Anjou and Kiba for taking his boyfriend away for two weeks (whether he actually experienced envy was a different, and firmly not discussed, matter). He hadn’t _clung_ , had encouraged Chrono to go, even, had done everything the way he knew he should, because he _did_ , genuinely, want Chrono to have fun, and to discover things, and to see his friends. But he still felt his absence in every little aspect of his daily life that was usually coloured by his warmth, and although it hadn’t affected his work, he still couldn’t help but find himself a little pathetic.  
He was _pining_.  
After having spent so many years of his life resolutely alone, the speed with which he’d come to take that warmth for granted and miss it so acutely when Chrono was gone was a little scary.

Still, he made a point to take proper care of himself. It was part for Chrono’s own sake, and out of fear of the disappointed, worried look he was bound to give him if he came home and found him or the apartment a mess, and part because he knew how quickly he could slide back into the habits of his late teenage years, how easily depression’s deeply rooted routines could come back to the surface if one left any vacant space for them to occupy, even now that the depression itself was firmly a thing of the past.  
And so before Chrono had left, he had made himself a meal plan for the two weeks, being realistic about how often he would need to order said food and just rest, and so far, four days into the trip, he was on schedule, something he was quietly proud of.  
It was still, however, enough effort that by the time he finished his meal (rice, steamed vegetables, the second half of yesterday’s misshapen rolled omelette), he found himself struggling with intense weariness, and barely made himself put his plate and bowl in the dishwasher before collapsing into bed, exhausted.  
And then waited, in vain, for sleep to come.  
He turned. Sleep still eluded him. Granted, it _was_ a little earlier than his usual bedtime, but he was also _much_ more tired than he usually was, and at the rate he was tossing and turning, his normal hour would soon pass anyway.  
He had definitely not missed insomnia. How quickly one forgot how it felt once one was granted the luxury of a strong and warm body against one’s back on most nights.  
He was about to just give up and get back up to down a cup of coffee and work on Association business when his phone rang.  
One second and the slightest glimpse of the first character of the name on the screen was all it took him to go from irritably glancing at the screen to scrambling for his phone and pressing the green icon.  
“Chrono?” he said, trying to keep his voice even and aware, despite that, of the slight quiver in it.  
“Oh! Kouji! Hope I didn’t wake you up?”  
“You didn’t. I couldn’t sleep,” said Ibuki, who would not have minded in the least even if he _had_ been asleep.  
“Oh good. How was your day.”  
Ibuki breathed out slowly. He’d sat back up to answer, but already tension was draining out of him. It made him self-conscious.  
“It was fine… the main branch is surprisingly quiet this week. With the rain, it seems people aren’t motivated to venture further than their local branch, if at all.” He paused. “Chrono, shouldn’t… aren’t you out with your friends?” _Should you really be talking to me?_ his tone asked, although he very much did want Chrono to be talking to him.  
“Oh, I’m back at the hotel. The heat is a _killer_ so we’re hiding inside for a few hours. We’ll go back out when the sun starts going down.”  
“Is that so…”  
More energy was draining out of him. Without even consciously thinking about it, he took a silent decision and let himself slide back into a horizontal position, curled slightly on his side, and put the phone right next to his head on the pillow.  
“When noon passed and it was still liveable I thought we’d be fine, but turns out it gets worse mid-afternoon… didn’t know France could get so _hot_ this early. Or that it’d be this hilly. I’ve been clambering up and down tiny sloped streets all morning.”  
He was chatting away rather than actually complaining, and it brought a warm smile to Ibuki’s lips, wooing his eyelids closed.  
“Japan isn’t exactly flat either,” he said, warm and fond. “You need to get out of Tokyo more.”  
“Yeah, yeah, call me a city boy, why don’t you?” Chrono huffed, sounding not offended in the least.  
“You are. It’s part of your charm.”  
“How is that charming?” Chrono laughed.  
“You know the streets well, can navigate the train and subway without looking up your destination, and have a frankly uncanny instinct for which shops will have sales on groceries and when.”  
Through the phone, Chrono’s laugh came almost like a giggle. Ibuki was almost glad that he couldn’t see him, because his own face was wearing a grin to match it.  
“Yes, I’m sure my tight budgeting is a seduction asset,” Chrono joked.  
“It can be if someone is looking for a responsible husband.” And before Chrono could ponder on his slip-up, he continued: “Maybe we should correct this. We could take a long weekend and take a train somewhere…”  
“If it’ll make you take a break, I’m definitely not complaining.”  
“Where do you want to go, then?”  
“How about I leave it to you? Bring me somewhere you want me to see.”  
“Mmm. I’ll think about it.”  
He closed his eyes again for a few moments. With the rain still hammering outside, the bedroom felt like a cocoon, the faint light of his bedside lamp isolated from the outside world by the noise of raindrops hitting the walls and windows.  
Combined with Chrono’s voice, it was surprisingly relaxing.  
“What’s Montpellier like?” he asked, more to hear more of it than anything. “Besides ‘hot’?”  
“Pretty. There’s all these stone houses just stuck to each other up those slopes, and paved streets… and then when you get down to the lower areas it’s all tall stone buildings and wide streets and plazas, more like the France you actually see in movies or postcards.” Ibuki chuckled, and Chrono continued. “And then you turn around and _bam_ , weird post-modern glass building. Honestly that part doesn’t feel too different from home. The weird juxtapositions. You know.”  
“I think I see what you mean.”  
“I thought there’d be more tourist stuff everywhere, but apparently the big touristy hubs are further East. According to the owner of the café we ate at.” The noise of rustling fabric told Ibuki that Chrono had probably flipped around on his own bed. “You wouldn’t believe how easily Tokoha charmed the locals. She just shows up with her Anjou Smile and her perfectly fluent French and looks genuinely interested and they’re all excited to actually chat about things. Meanwhile, Shion,” he added, snickering slightly, “is still sulking because they can’t understand him half the time. I think it never hit him that the average person isn’t as good at understanding foreign accents as diplomats and expat businessmen.”  
Ibuki smiled lightly. His eyes had once more closed, but it only made Chrono’s voice surround him more, and he was growing more and more content to just listen.  
“Aichi said he was able to navigate most of the time using English,” he still offered, to not put the entire weight of the conversation on Chrono.  
“Yeah, I mean, he probably could, but imagine how awkward that would be when they can see we have a fluent speaker with us. So he has to let her talk and it’s just so funny. Of course,” he added, brightly, “I can barely understand anything they say, but honestly I’m fine with just letting them do the talking. It’s kind of restful. And no one here knows me except the super intense Vanguard fans, so that’s a nice change too. Although,” he added with a chuckle, “this one guy stopped us to ask where I got my jacket.”  
“The red one?” Ibuki murmured.  
“Yeah.”  
“I did tell you you looked wonderful in it.”  
“Y-yeah well. I had to crush his hopes.”  
Ibuki’s eyelids were as heavy as his heart was light.  
“So what are your plans for the next few days?”  
“We’re staying here for a couple of days, and then moving on to Toulouse… one of Tokoha’s old friends from school lives there and she wants to give us the tour and take us into the mountains for a day… Tokoha said there’s some local foods I really need to try… hopefully it’s not sweets because there’s ice cream shops everywhere here and the sugar is going to kill me.”  
Somewhere at the back of Ibuki’s mind, the part of him that was still connected to the waking world half-formed a reply suggesting that it would at least help against the heat.  
But unfortunately, he was already asleep, and the words never made it to his mouth.  
“… you really need to rest more,” Chrono’s gentle voice said. “Well, after that, we’re off to…”

Two hours later, Shion opened the door to Chrono’s room.  
“It’s still too early for dinner, but we thought we’d get cool drinks somewhere near the fountain—”  
Chrono, who had been laying on his side, absently toying with some spread-out cards with one hand while his phone, plugged and apparently still on call, lay right next to his head, jumped, and immediately reached for said phone, turning it off.  
Shion raised him an eyebrow.  
“You could have knocked,” Chrono said, glaring at him and uncharacteristically flustered.  
“Your light was on. Why, you weren’t getting sexy, were you?”  
“ _No_.”  
“This isn’t what I paid those data plans for,” he teased. “What if we’d needed to reach you!”  
“I’m just a room away from you and you can just come talk to me. _Like you just did_.”  
Shion beamed.  
“True. So, beer or no beer?”  
“… give me a minute. I’ll meet you in the lobby.”  
“Don’t take too long~”  
And he walked out, leaving Chrono to his blush.

On the other end of the world, Ibuki’s phone shortly lit up again with a message notification, and then, being untouched, went dark again.  
The picture was a photograph of Chrono, slightly pink but smiling warmly.  
**Sleep well. I’ll talk to you again tomorrow.**

**Author's Note:**

> I'm trying to keep these coming to warm up before NaNo! If there's stuff you really want to see, feel free to slide a suggestion my way, here or on twitter, I'll do it if inspiration strikes.  
> For now, thank you for reading! Comments are always lovely and appreciated. :3


End file.
